The invention relates to the prevention of a theft of a vehicle or articles placed therein and a mischief done to a vehicle.
A vehicle is generally provided with a number of members which cover openings such as side windows including a door window located next to a driver's seat, a door window next to an assistant driver's seat and two other door windows which are disposed adjacent to rear seats; and openings formed in a sun roof (roof panel), a luggage lid and an engine hood. If a user of the vehicle forgets to close these openings or if he leaves selected openings open in order to avoid a temperature rise inside the vehicle, the vehicle is subject to harm in that an article placed within the vehicle may be stolen or an inside locking button or a door lock/unlock knob may be accessible through an opening to be operated to unlock the door. Since these members which cover the openings are disposed to be movable, it is also possible that these members may be externally tampered open, again causing similar harm.
To prevent such harm from occurring, there is proposed a theft preventing apparatus which gives off an alarm whenever an onboard inside locking button is operated before a door is opened. Specifically, the apparatus is provided with a hidden switch which turns an alarm unit on and off. The switch may be operated by a driver to disable the alarm function after he has gotten into the vehicle, and is operated to enable the alarm function when the vehicle is parked.
There is also proposed a theft preventing apparatus which gives off an alarm in response to the detection of an oscillation of the vehicle or a change in the electric potential of the car body. As before, a hidden switch which is provided in this apparatus may be operated to enable an alarm function when the vehicle is parked. If an opening such as a side window or that formed in the sun roof is tampered with, a resulting oscillation of the vehicle or a change in the electric potential of the car body may be detected to give off an alarm.
The both theft preventive apparatus mentioned above are troublesome and unreliable in operation since the setting or resetting of the alarm function of the apparatus is left to the driver of the vehicle. Specifically, if the driver forgets to set the alarm function, the latter function cannot be activated. Conversely, if the driver forgets to reset the alarm function, the theft preventing apparatus will be effectively activated when an owner driver is using the vehicle. In particular, in respect to the latter aspect, there is a difficulty in the timing of setting and resetting the apparatus since an oscillation of the vehicle or a change in the electric potential of the car body is caused as the driver gets on or off the vehicle. Because malfunctioning is frequently experienced, the driver tends to be reluctant to the use of the apparatus.
Finally, if the theft preventing apparatus is set operative, it is possible to open an engine hood by operating an engine hood unlatch knob disposed adjacent to the driver's seat which may be accessible through an opening, thus disconnecting the power line to shut down the operation of the system. A sufficient length of time is then available for an aggressor to remove the theft preventing apparatus or to hunt for any article left within the vehicle. Thus it will be seen that a conventional theft preventing apparatus involves various inconveniences and provides a reliability which is less than desired inasmuch as a collective guard against every possible harm is not provided.